Hanoi
Vietnam will conduct mass testing in Hanoi for 21,000 people who recently returned from the central city of Danang, as the country tries to stem the first domestic outbreak since April. The mass testing will take place from Thursday to Saturday, using rapid test kits, the city’s administration said in a statement.
The health ministry sent text messages to all mobile phone users among the country’s 95 million people urging anyone who visited Danang from July 1 to come forward, after a new wave of the virus spread to at least six cities and provinces in six days, all linked to Danang. Hanoi’s ruling body on Thursday said mass testing would be carried out until Saturday among thousands of residents who recently returned from Danang, a popular holiday getaway that has been a big draw since restrictions were eased.
The response to the Danang outbreak is in line with a centralised quarantine programme and aggressive contact-tracing system that has seen Vietnam lauded for keeping its coronavirus tally to just a few hundred cases, with no fatalities. Hanoi banned large gatherings and ordered bars closed from midnight Wednesday and its chairman Nguyen Duc Chung declared the city must “act now and act fast”.—Reuters
